http://www.polarfield.com/

Follow us! (Not that we're geese.) Photo: David Sinnett, USDA

Dude, we’ve moved. Find us over on the new Polar Field Services Web site. Adjust your thingamajigs to point to the new blog site.

http://www.polarfield.com/blog/

Yes, the new Polar Field Services Web site.

We are delighted to announce the launch of the new PFS Web site: www.polarfield.services.com

On the PFS site, you can find information about services we provide, profiles of some of our key staff, a changing gallery of polar images showing research we support, our field operations, and the polar world. In addition, you can stop by the Pets of PFS page to visit our four-legged colleagues.

And, of course, you can find the PFS blog, Field Notes.

We are pleased with the kernel that the new site represents, and look forward to continuing to grow it over the next months and years. We think we’ve documented some of the unique character of the important work we support, as well as the pride we take at PFS in the services we provide–and the fun we have while doing so.

Waiting for GrIT

Awbrey Cornelison (a Dog of PFS). Photo: Allen Cornelison

Awbrey, an irrepressible four-legger, demonstrates a GrIT state of mind this morning, as we all are on the lookout for the Greenland Inland Traverse’s arrival at Summit Station today.

They should pull up at the front door in a few hours, after nearly 30 days and well over 700 miles of snow riding. Go GrIT, go!

Barrow Whaling

 

A traditional umiaq boat awaits the action on the sea ice near a red buoy. The latter is attached to the harpoon. It keeps the animal afloat after the kill. Photos: Faustine Mercer

Our PFS colleague Faustine Mercer was invited along on a whale hunt a few weeks ago. Along with Steve Hastings, Faustine manages CPS science support for National Science Foundation-funded researchers at Barrow, Alaska, on the Chukchi Sea coast.  She spends a long stretch of the spring and summer in Barrow, and was on hand when a friend, Josh Bacon, invited her along to witness the hunt. 

“Josh works as a biologist for the Wildlife Department,” Faustine explained. “When a whale is killed, someone from the Department samples tissues and makes measurements of the whale. Because of the whale census also going on and the limited number of staff, he asked me if I wanted to help him.”

Barrow’s traditional culture is based on subsistence principals, which means that the Inuit who live there rely on the land and the ocean primarily for the food they eat. It is one of nine Alaskan communities permitted to harvest the cetaceans by the International Whaling Committee.  Around 50 bowhead whales are caught each year in Alaska.

In Barrow, the whale harvest is a very big deal, an event governed by tradition and the whaling captains who lead the hunt (and the community).  When they arrived at the whaling camp, Josh and Faustine “talked to the whaling captain to make sure he was OK with us being there,” Faustine recalled.  “We got formally invited by him to do whatever we needed to.” 

While preparing to sample and measure the whale, Faustine witnessed the hunters pursuing another whale.

A Barrow, Alaska, whaling crew in a traditional animal-skin-covered boat goes after a humpback whale. Photos: Faustine Mercer

“I was on the sea ice the whole time, right next to the lead. It was a wide flat area after the pressure ridge, perfect for setting camp and hunting.

“We were checking on our whale that was still in the water, attached by the tail when the other whalers jumped in their umiaq (animal skin boat) to follow a whale that had just passed them. That happened right in front of me, less than 100m away.”

Later, the activity returned to the whale Faustine wanted to examine. “It took almost three hours to pull it up a ramp that the crew (20 people and five snowmachines) made on the ice. People from other crews helped also, but it was a fairly small number. Once the whale was on the ramp, they put some blocking tackles together, hooked it up to the tail, and people and snowmobiles started to pull.”

About 20 people helped to pull the whale out of the water.

As soon as the whale was landed, “butchering started right away, so we had only a few minutes to take our measurements. They cut a piece of blubber right away and gave it to the women so they could start making unalik (boiled skin and blubber) to give to everyone who was helping.”

The butchering portion was an efficient operation orchestrated by the whaling captain, Faustine said. When it was over, “the captain got to choose which part he wanted. Then, everyone who helped with butchering got a share.  A woman took people’s names and the blubber and meat was divided up on the ice according to the list. They used everything except for the guts and eyes (we actually took the eye balls to know the exact age). Someone cut the liver skin off too, as they use it to make drums. In less than three hours, the whale had totally disappeared.”

Later, when it was ready, Faustine tried her share of unalik—the boiled skin and blubber of the fresh whale that is a tradition of the harvest. “The unalik tasted kind of like fish, not bad at all, though fat as expected. The texture of the skin after being boiled is totally different than expected, as fresh it feels rubbery and looks chewy.

“People were laughing and happy, so I can say it was a celebration!”

For more on traditional hunting, visit http://www.nativetech.org/inupiat/index.html

The Women of Berg Field Center

Rosemary Garofalo, Elizabeth Morton, Mimi Fujino, and Kathy Young in Kangerlussuaq, Greenland. Photo: Marie McLane

The stars and planets and whirlwind lives of some legendary women aligned a few weeks ago. The women, each of whom fledged her polar career at the McMurdo Station, Antarctica field gear shop called the Berg Field Center (BFC), bumped into each other in Kangerlussuaq, NSF’s research program hub in Greenland.  Their combined years represent decades of service to the antarctic research community. 

We got to thinking about how many of us at Polar Field Services have worked in the BFC. Our Kahuna, Jill Ferris, got her start there in the mid-1980s. Greenland project manager Robin Abbott, Science planner Karla College, and Alaska staffers Marin Kuizenga and Matt Irinaga also are BFC alumni. Who else?

“I’m married to a former BFCer (1980-1985), does that count?”–Robbie Score, married to Rob Robbins

“”Yes, I too married a BFC person. Steve [Munsell] spent one year working there. He made the round table that everyone sits around and it is still there today. His year was in 1986.”–Kathy Young

“Fun days indeed!!”–Robin Abbott

Keep on TREC-ing

By Marcy Davis

Pictured outside the University of Alaska Museum of the North, the 2010 PolarTREC teachers and alumni (left to right), Jeff Peneston (Icebreaker Oden-2008), Jim Pottinger, Josh Dugat, Cheryl Forster, Chantelle Rose, Mike Lampert, Keri Rodgers, Karl Horeis, Tina Sander, Michele Cross (McMurdo Station-2009), Craig Beals (Summit-2008), Anne Marie Wotkyns, Bill Schmoker, Lesley Urasky, and Claude Larson. Unless otherwise noted, photos by Kristin Timm, Arctic Consortium of the United States, for PolarTREC

It’s that time of year again! Janet Warburton and Kristin Timm of the Arctic Research Consortium of the U.S. (ARCUS) are preparing K-12 educators from across the United States for upcoming field experiences in the Arctic and Antarctic.  Twelve teachers who spent a week in Fairbanks, Alaska, in April for the PolarTREC Orientation and ShareFair, an intensive week-long introduction to the professional development experience.

PolarTREC (Teachers and Researchers Exploring and Collaborating), now in its fourth year (and with a recent NSF funding renewal through December of 2013), is a professional development program for K-12 educators focused on improving science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education.

Through teacher-researcher collaborations and hands-on field experiences, teachers become an essential bridge between cutting-edge polar science and the public. By working closely with selected PolarTREC research teams through application review and teacher interviews, researchers and teachers are matched across a wide range of scientific disciplines to ensure that teachers’ interests are aligned with science project goals. After much training and preparation, teachers spend 2-6 weeks in the field with their research team. During their time out, teachers share their experiences through webinars, multimedia journals, and bulletin boards on PolarTREC’s interactive Web site.

Ann Harding and Rachael Orben prepare to take blood samples of captured birds, Kap Hoegh, Greenland. Photo by Mary Anne Pella-Donnelly (PolarTREC 2007), Courtesy of ARCUS

PolarTREC’s mission includes increasing teachers’ knowledge of polar science along with their ability to teach pertinent science concepts. The program allows teachers to improve their instruction by participating in a new and exciting research experience, exposing them to new ideas and incorporating technology both in and out of the field. Teachers also develop new curricula, which is disseminated through the PolarTREC site. PolarTREC wants their teachers to inspire students to become more aware of the Polar Regions and explore opportunities to further their education and explore occupations in STEM areas.

During the PolarTREC orientation teachers learned background science content, how to communicate successfully from the field, and how to develop polar science education and outreach plans and ideas. Hands-on breakout sessions include digital photography, journaling methods, using educational technologies, and bringing science into the classroom. PolarTREC teacher and research alumni as well as representatives from CH2M HILL Polar Services (CPS) were also on hand in-person and virtually to share experiences and address teacher questions and expectations.

Following a presentation from Roy Stehle of SRI International (part of CPS), teacher Anne Marie Wotkyns practiced using the satellite phone by calling home from the Westmark Hotel parking lot. Wotkyns will work with scientists on the Icebreaker Oden in November.

PolarTREC Alumni, Craig Beals (Summit-2008), offers advice to the new group of teachers. Three PolarTREC alumni were on hand during orientation to share information and lessons learned about their field experience, maintaining collaborations with the research team, and taking PolarTREC back to the classroom.

Matt Irinaga of Polar Field Services (part of CPS) explains the science of cold weather dressing: layer, layer, layer! Photo: Robbie Score

We’ll be checking in on PolarTREC teachers during their field experiences – stay tuned! 

GrIT: On to Summit

 All photos: Robin Davies

The GrIT team greets Zoe Courville at NEEM.

After about three weeks and 400 miles—many of which were wind-blown and snowy on the soft, roadless route toward Summit—the Greenland Inland Traverse team (GrIT) rolled into the international deep drilling camp NEEM last Thursday, 12 May. 

GoNorth! Too  

The Polar Husky superstars of GoNorth! arrived on the 12^th as well, in time for project members with teaching and other commitments to meet the flight scheduled for the 13^th. Of course that flight was delayed a day due to weather on the ice cap, but eventually the plane came, and personnel were appropriately shuffled.  

The GoNorth! Polar Husky super stars run into NEEM camp.

Exit Jim Lever, Enter Zoe Courville

The GrIT team welcomed Zoe Courville of CRREL on Saturday. We hear the mood was festive at NEEM camp that evening, as many camp personnel were newly arrived on the day’s ANG flight, as well.  The NEEM blog site notes that “Everybody had a fine evening, and a lot of people joined in the mid-night dance, featuring the Danish group “Sweet hearts.” 

Back to work on Sunday: The GrIT team conducted maintenance on traverse vehicles, delivered 1500 gallons of fuel to NEEM, and reconfigured the loads, shifting another1500 gallons of fuel to the Tucker’s fuel bladder. Net load reduction for the Case: 21,600 pounds. “The Durabase (a semi-flexible plastic bed) is now on High-Molecular-Weight sleds to see if the sleds reduce the drag,” project manager Allen Cornelison noted. 

The team headed out for Summit on Sunday, another ~430 miles ahead.  On Monday “the Case was able to grab 7th gear,” a first, wrote Cornelison.  Still, “it was unable to go any faster probably because it was making 14-inch ruts.”  Despite soft snow conditions, the team advanced 45 miles.  

The LC-130 airplane (right) blows off the runway at NEEM. Skiway conditions were soft due to warm temperatures and wind storms. The "Iconic NEEM Dome" (the camp's main building) is seen just left of center.

More Sled Mobility Tests

The qualities of Greenland’s snow surface and sled mobility are clear foci of the GrIT’s experimental component. Before departing on the traverse, CRREL personnel at Thule fitted the Durabase sled with sensors that collected data at the snow/sled interface; when he returns to CRREL, Lever will analyze these data in hopes they shed light on how to make the interface more slippery. 

Back at Thule earlier this spring, Jim Lever prepared the HMV sleds for mobility experiments. Here, the sled is outfitted with heaters. The sensors to collect data on temperature and mobility can be seen along the edges. A second sled was tested using enhanced passive (solar) warming methods.

Jim Lever (right) changes batteries powering a datalogger collecting information on the mobility of the HMV sled with passive warming. The brown fuel bladder is covered with a radiation-absorbing black material. In the background, the second HMV carries a fuel bladder without the black material, for comparison. Allan Delaney (left) and 'Swing Boss' observe.

In addition, after departing the GrIT, Lever flew to Summit Station, where he is conducting mobility tests on a raft purchased specifically for traverse development.  Jim’s findings may be applied to improving bipolar mobility—for GrIT and its southern cousin, “SPoT” (the South Pole Traverse). 

The Greenland Inland Traverse is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). CH2M HILL Polar Services and Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratories are working together with the NSF to develop the traverse infrastructure and route. The 2010 spring traverse has several foci: find a safe overland route to Summit Station to help reduce logistical costs and environmental impacts of conducting research there; provide a research platform for scientists conducting field work in Greenland; optimize mobility by focusing on the sled/snow interface.  For more field notes coverage of GrIT, click here.  

GrIT contact:

Allen Cornelison, Polar Field Services, CH2M HILL Polar Services

GrIT project manager

allen at polarfield.com

All Photos by Swing Boss!

Willow Fitzgerald pulls up at the GrIT camp in the Tucker.

Robin Davies hops out of the Tucker. We can't say who took this photo, but it wasn't Robin.

Flashback to last week, during the storm.  Remember how Robin Davies and Willow Fitzgerald drove Allan Delaney the 70 miles back down to Thule Air Base last week in the Tucker in the storm?  Allan was to be extracted from the traverse via helicopter, but of course weather fouled that plan and so the team reverted to Plan B, an overland return–remember?So Robin and Willow were pinned in Thule overnight as the storm raged on. They managed to avoid a second overnight at the base when they scooted out of town during a momentary break in the weather. Up on the ice sheet, the storm continued, but the two were able to navigate using the Garmen 695 GPS units NSF purchased for moments just like these. 

We don’t have any pictures of this portion of the adventure because Robin forgot to bring his camera with him–an uncharacteristic moment of forgetfulness for the GrIT photographer. But all’s well that ends well, because the Swing Boss was ready with Robin’s camera when the heroes returned. He took all of the pictures in this post. Who is he? Ask the Swing Boss. 

Nice weather. The Tucker arrives at the GrIT camp.

The Greenland Inland Traverse is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). CH2M HILL Polar Services and Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratories are working together with the NSF to develop the traverse infrastructure and route. The 2010 spring traverse has several foci: find a safe overland route to Summit Station to help reduce logistical costs and environmental impacts of conducting research there; provide a research platform for scientists conducting field work in Greenland; optimize mobility by focusing on the sled/snow interface.  For more field notes coverage of GrIT, click here. GrIT contact: 

Allen Cornelison, Polar Field Services, CH2M HILL Polar Services

GrIT project manager

allen at polarfield.com

GoNorth!+GrIT=GrITGo’N!

Two Become One

All Photos: Robin Davies

Some gorgeous and well-mannered Polar Huskies wait for the humans to transfer the GoNorth! load to GrIT.

Adapt or fail: this may be the first rule of successful polar exploration, as countless stories from the age of the great adventurers (and from our own research clients) will attest. Over the weekend, while many of us celebrated Mother’s Day, there was a marriage of sorts on the Greenland ice sheet. The two traverse teams we’ve been following—GoNorth!’s Polar Husky-powered education effort, and GrIT’s tractor-towed operational effort—combined forces to get everyone back on schedule after last week’s stormy weather delayed progress.  

Mille Porsild, dog handler-in-chief, settles the canine team atop some GrIT cargo totes. Mille prefers to ride up on the totes with her pack, though there's room for her in the warm camping wannigan.

NEEM is the North Eemian drilling camp, an international research collaboration whose main goal is to harvest an ice core (for climate studies) that reaches all the way through the ice sheet. While the University of Copenhagen has overall management of NEEM and operates the camp, the National Science Foundation supports U.S. researchers (U Colorado’s Jim White leads this effort) and provides the heavy air lift as well. Air National Guard LC-130 planes fly between Kangerlussuaq and NEEM every ten days to two weeks—weather permitting, of course.  

So if the three miss this flight, they could be auxiliary NEEM staff for two weeks waiting for the next flight—an unhappy possibility given teaching and research commitments. (Some of us would pay good money to be stranded at the storied NEEM camp for a week or so with the likes of Danish polar research legends like Dorthe Dahl-Jensen and JP Steffensen, but that’s a tale for another post.)  

“With the loads reconfigured (once they passed through the crevassed zone with its steep inclines), the GrIT is moving forward at a decent clip. The goal is to make at least 40 miles per day,” Allen explained. “Over the past few days, they have been achieving their goal even with some soft snow.”  

Settled down and ready to make tracks.

While GrIT machines can continue plowing ahead in most storm conditions, the GoNorth! dogs, though incredibly strong and courageous, must at some point hunker down and wait for the worst weather to clear–they are not made of metal. The risk that the GoNorth! team might be delayed again by a good blow was considered too great, and so all have joined the GrIT traverse. That’s an additional 23 dogs, four people, sleds and gear.  

In short, a parade.  

  

“With firm snow, the Case has been able to hold 6^th gear with little slippage,” Cornelison continued. “Ruts are between four and six inches. The Tucker has been holding second gear and keeping up with the Case though towing multiple sleds and the 3,000-gallon fuel bladder, which they have been fueling from. I believe that the Tucker load is about 120 feet long now.”  

“The weather has been cooperating nicely with unlimited visibility, sunny skies, light winds and temperatures between -4 and +10F.”  

“The teams camped Sunday night 110 miles from NEEM. They should arrive at NEEM mid-day on the 12^th.”   

 

 

 

 

Robin writes, "The Case has a Greenlandic name, Qimuttuuaraq. It's a name that's often given to a small dog that pulls hard for its weight. A rough translation would be 'Small dog with big heart'." We think the same could be said of all souls on the traverse, four- and two-legged alike.

The Greenland Inland Traverse is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). CH2M HILL Polar Services and Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratories are working together with the NSF to develop the traverse infrastructure and route. The 2010 spring traverse has several foci: find a safe overland route to Summit Station to help reduce logistical costs and environmental impacts of conducting research there; provide a research platform for scientists conducting field work in Greenland; optimize mobility by focusing on the sled/snow interface.  For more field notes coverage of GrIT, click here.  

GrIT contact:

Allen Cornelison, Polar Field Services, CH2M HILL Polar Services

GrIT project manager

allen at polarfield.com

 

Delivering Boardwalk

PFSers Larry Gullingsrud and Annelisa Neely deliver boardwalk to Mike Weintraub's tundra plots at Imnavait Creek. Researchers will use the dark material in the background to artificially warm some of the tundra plots. Photo: Jason Neely

University of Toledo’s Mike Weintraub returned to Imnavait Creek near Toolik Field Station last week for the first full season of tundra plot studies supported by his recent NSF grant.  The project is one of a group of new research to be fielded at/near Toolik this year to study changing seasonality in the Arctic (CSAS).  Specifically, Weintraub’s team is looking at how altered timing of seasonal events—earlier spring thaw and later fall freeze, for example—may affect nitrogen cycling in the soil, and how that in turn impacts tundra plant and microbe growth.

Polar Field Services staff returned to Toolik in late April for spring science support and station facilities projects. Among the larger science efforts, Jason Neely’s team placed about 3000 linear feet of boardwalk out on Imnavait Creek tundra manipulation plots for Weintraub’s CSAS soil nutrient experiment.   The boardwalk protects the fragile, slow-growing tundra from the many footsteps of researchers visiting the plots to collect plants, data and/or to manipulate the conditions.  The Weintraub team will continue working on the CSAS project for the length of the summer season at Toolik Field Station, departing in late August.

Weintraub heads an interdisciplinary collaboration composed of four other PIs:  Paddy Sullivan (U Alaska), Josh Schimel (U California), Edward Rastetter (Marine Biological Laboratory), and Heidi Steltzer (Colorado State U).

Researchers will manipulate the timing of seasonally driven processes in tussock tundra ecosystems by advancing the timing of snowmelt with radiation-absorbing fabric placed over the snowpack in the late spring and by using open-top warming chambers in concert with advanced snowmelt. They will follow how seasonally driven plant and soil dynamics are affected by changes in the timing of snowmelt and warming.

GrIT: Circumzenithal Arc

Parahelia with circumzenithal arc. Greenland ice sheet, May 6, 2010. Photo: Robin Davies

From Robin’s email:

“I got this shot yesterday afternoon, as we reconfigured the Tucker load (which is why the outhouse is in the frame). As the cloud thinned and the sky got bluer, the sun halo and sun dogs that had been coming and going for some time  suddenly developed a Circumzenithal Arc (the inverted rainbow above the sun), which sent me scrambling for my camera.

“I’ve been trying to get a good shot of one of these ever since I’ve been coming to Greenland and now I’ve got one with an outhouse in it!”